Outcome of Religious And Traditional Leaders Engagement

GADA under the Spotlight Initiative Project carried out training for 45 chiefs to increase their perception around Gender Based Violence (GBV), Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), Harmful Practices (HP), Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) in their communities and their role as change agents.

Before this engagement, the participants did not see anything wrong in this practice as they saw it as their custom handed down to them which needs to be sustained.

The harmful practices practiced in Cross River State include Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), Child Marriage, Widowhood Practice, Female Inheritance, etc. Top on the chart is the Obanliku Money Woman Practice where young girls are promised as Collateral for loans.

GADA’s work with this group resulted in the following:

  • 53 (17 females and 36 males) traditional and religious leaders from 5 states in the South-South, i.e Edo, Bayelsa, Delta, Rivers, Akwa-Ibom and Cross River State (Calabar South, Calabar Municipality, Akamkpa, Obanliku, Odukpani, Yakurr and Yala) have the capacity to advocate for legislation, doctrines and policies on VAWG/SGB/HP.

    Though GADA did not work directly with churches, they engaged with christian leaders of the various blocs in the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN)

  • Traditional and Religious leaders have taken up their responsibilities as watch persons in their various communities. E.g the abolishment of the money woman practice in Obanliku, banishment or penalty for anyone caught perpetrating rape in Efut Uwanse, Calabar South.

OUTPUTS

  1. The CAN leader, Obanliku, carried out sensitization and awareness during the monthly Obanliku CAN meetings.

  2. The women leader of Bebi, Mrs Kayang Grace mobilized women and young girls to carry out an awareness and sensitization of GBV to mark the 16 Days of Activism in Bebi community.

  3. HRH - Ushen Pius, the clan head of Bukomanya/Bayayam Clan, thanked the Spotlight team for this timely intervention. According to him “since the coming of the team to Obanliku, things have changed for the better”.

    He pointed out that with the training he received from GADA team, more women have been engaged in the decision-making process in his clan and that girls were now entitled to enjoy their parent’s inheritance unlike before.

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